MINORITY PRESIDENTS


Another common use of the term "minority president" means simply that a man was elected without a majority of the popular vote. A surprising number of Presidents have been elected this way. The electoral vote system tends to magnify the size of the electoral victory since only the winner's votes count; since we have basically a winner-take-all system for determing each state's electoral votes, the popular votes of those who vote for the losing candidate don't count. An election that may be close in terms of the popular vote will not be close in the Electoral College.

In addition to those elections mentioned already, there have been a large number of other "minority presidents" due to the fact that there are always more than just the two major candidates running. Surprisingly strong showing by third party candidates have often prevented a popular vote majority, and in one or two cases have even changed the final result of the election. The best example of this is the election of 1848 when former President Martin Van Buren ran on the Free Soil Party ticket. Although he did not win a single state or electoral vote, he split the Democratic majority in his home state of New York, allowing Whig candidate Zachary Taylor to win the state with a plurality of the popular vote. The electoral vote was so close, that had Taylor lost New York, he would have lost the election.

A number of other Presidents were elected without a majority of the popular votes. That means, they were elected even though a majority of the people voted against them:

Year/ President/ Popular Vote

1824 J.Q. Adams 30.92%

1844 James K. Polk 49.54%

1848 Zachary Taylor 47.28%

1856 James Buchanan 45.28%

1860 Abraham Lincoln 39.82%

1876 Rutherford B. Hayes 47.95%

1880 James A. Garfield 48.27%

1884 Grover Cleveland 48.50%

1888 Benjamin Harrison 47.82%

1892 Grover Cleveland 46.05%

1912 Woodrow Wilson 41.84%

1916 Woodrow Wilson 49.24%

1948 Harry S. Truman 49.51%

1960 John F. Kennedy 49.72%

1968 Richard M. Nixon 43.42%

1992 William Clinton 43.01%

1996 William Clinton 49.24%

One reason that Congress is hesitant to abolish the Electoral College and change to a direct popular vote requiring a majority to win is that most elections would require a runoff. As past history shows us, this would often result in a situation in which the person elected President would have had more people vote against him than for him in the initial election, again raising the question of his "mandate" to govern. If not a majority, what percentage of the vote would be required to win? That has been another difficult question that protects the existence of the Electoral College. The

The copyright of the article MINORITY PRESIDENTS in American Presidents is owned by John S. Cooper. Permission to republish MINORITY PRESIDENTS in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.

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